How White Is Your Tongue?

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⏰ IN A RUSH?

Today’s 30-Second Summary

If you don’t have time to read the whole email today, here are some key takeaways:

• A small amount of whiteness on your tongue is generally healthy and normal; lots is not. Soreness and/or bleeding also are not.

  • The little whiteness that most people often have is bacteria and dead cells. Sounds bad, but your mouth has a microbiome, is supposed to have one, and would suffer without it. Brushing/scraping is fine.

  • More whiteness and/or other symptoms are another matter, often a fungal infection, and will likely need more treatment than a mere brushing/scraping. See today’s main feature for risk factors and more!

• Being unable to easily participate in spoken conversations is not just an inconvenience; it’s also a [causal, fixable] risk factor for age-related cognitive decline.

  • Today’s sponsor, Hear.com, are offering the most cutting-edge dual-processing technology in hearing aids that isolate and separate speech from background noise.

Read on to learn about these things and more…

👀 WATCH AND LEARN

TEDx | Why fasting bolsters brain power (16:43)

Dr. Mark Mattson, Chief of the Laboratory of Neurosciences at the National Institute on Aging, professor of Neuroscience at The Johns Hopkins University, and one of the foremost researchers in the area of cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer's Disease, Parkinson's Disease, and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, explains:

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❓ MAIN FEATURE

It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!

Have a question or a request? We love to hear from you!

In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!

As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!

So, no question/request too big or small 😎

❝So its normal to develop a white sort of coating on the tongue, right? It develops when I eat, and is able to (somewhat) easily be brushed off❞

If (and only if) there is no soreness and the coverage of the whiteness is not extreme, then, yes, that is normal and fine.

Your mouth has a microbiome, and it's supposed to have one (helps keep the conditions in your mouth correct, so that food is broken down and/but your gums and teeth aren't).

Read more: The oral microbiome: Role of key organisms and complex networks in oral health and disease

The whiteness you often see on a healthy tongue is, for the most part, bacteria and dead cells—harmless.

Cleaning the whiteness off with your brush is fine. You can also scrape off with floss is similar if you prefer. Or a tongue-scraper! Those can be especially good for people for whom brushing the tongue is an unpleasant sensation. Or you can just leave it, if it doesn’t bother you.

By the way, that microbiome is a reason it can be good to go easy on the mouthwash. Moderate use of mouthwash is usually fine, but you don't want to wipe out your microbiome then have it taken over by unpleasantries that the mouthwash didn't kill (unpleasantries like C. albicans).

There are other mouthwash-related considerations too:

Toothpastes and mouthwashes: which kinds help, and which kinds harm?

If you start to get soreness, that probably means the papillae (little villi-like things) are inflamed. If there is soreness, and/or the whiteness is extreme, then it could be a fungal infection (usually C. albicans, also called Thrush), in which case, antifungal medications will be needed, which you can probably get over the counter from your pharmacist.

Other risk factors include a sugary diet, smoking, and medications that have “dry mouth” as a side effect.

Read more: Can oral thrush be prevented?

If you have any symptoms more exciting than the above, then definitely see a doctor.

Take care!

📊 POLL

We turn the tables and ask you a question…

We’ll then talk about this tomorrow:

❤️ OUR SPONSORS MAKE THIS PUBLICATION POSSIBLE

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🤫 A WORD TO THE WISE

📖 ONE-MINUTE BOOK REVIEW

Staring At The Sun: Being At Peace With Your Own Mortality – by Dr. Irvin Yalom

For most of us, dying is the last thing we want to do. We may fear it; we may ignore it; we may try to beat it—but it's a constant existential threat whether we want it or not.

This book is about "death anxiety", either direct (conscious fear of impending death) or sublimated (not necessarily realising what we're avoiding thinking about it). In its broadest sense, the fear of death can be described as rational. But angst about it probably won't help, so this book looks to help us overcome that.

The style of the book is largely anecdotal, in which the author uses examples from his therapeutic practice to illustrate ways in which the fear of death can manifest, and ways in which it can be managed healthily.

Subjective criticism: while this author developed existential therapy, many of the ideas in this book lean heavily on the psychodynamic approach derived from Freud, and this reviewer isn't a fan of that. But nevertheless, many of the examples here are thought-provoking and useful, so it is not too strong a criticism.

Bottom line: there are many ways to manage one's mortality, and this book brings attention to a range of possibilities.

Click here to check out Staring At The Sun, and manage your mortality!

May today see you in an excellent state of wellbeing,

The 10almonds Team